


Unspoken

by Lazchan



Category: Akatsuki no Yona | Yona of the Dawn
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-15 12:30:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4606809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lazchan/pseuds/Lazchan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This started originally as "what if the dragons had a sibling" and while it was supposed to be full of pain, it didn't quite go down that route (yet). I may write a Jaeha specific chapter. XD</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unspoken

He wasn't sure at all how the topic came up, but somehow he was certain that Kija started it. Yona was leaning up against Shin-ah as the small group talked. It was a moment where they could relax and learn about each other and it was something Yona was clearly happy about, but the subject itself…

 

"I was an only child," Yona said softly. "My mother died when I was very young and I don't remember a great deal about her, except that she had black hair, like my father." She gave them all a rueful smile. "I didn't know why I had red hair at the time." She tugged on a longer strand and made a face. "And it seems really sort of silly to have red hair again. You all apparently knew me without the signal fire."

 

"Was it a lonely childhood, princess?" Kija asked softly, curious. He himself didn't exactly have a great deal of playmates, but was because of what he was. 

 

Yona shook her head at that. "No, I was always with Hak and…" she felt silent a moment, the unspoken name leaving a sour taste in her mouth for a moment and she was immensely grateful that Hak was out scouting with Zeno, trusting her dragons to protect her. He would be back soon enough, but for this moment at least, he didn't have to hear  _his_  name, or any reference to him. "No, I usually had someone nearby," she finished, staring down at her lap for a moment and taking a deep breath.

"I—well," Kija coughed and ran a hand through his hair. "I wasn't an only child, that is for certain. My granny made sure my father had plenty of children to hopefully carry the Hakuryuu blood and it eventually ended with me." He looked off. "Not that we actually played together, really. I was set apart from a young age, as soon as my father died. I trained, of course—learned the histories of the dragons and the area, but after I became the Hakuryuu of the village, it wasn't considered correct for me to be with the other children. This hand… " he gestured with this right hand, "had to be protected above all, to serve my master when he came." He smiled brightly, lovingly at Yona. "I'm grateful that they took such good care of me that I was able to be there for you, princess."

 

She smiled at him and gripped his hand gently, expression understanding. He had been terribly lonely, but he had pushed it all under the guise of wanting to do the best for his people. "Well, you have brothers here," she teased. "Three of them that will bounce you around and tease you whenever you're least expecting it."

 

She flicked her gaze to Shin-ah and Jaeha, uncertain. She knew that Shin-ah had only known his predecessor; to the point where he never even had a name. Jaeha, though—she wasn't sure about him at all, but there was a sense of unease there that she didn't want to probe. Jaeha beat her to it, though, a bright smile on his face.

 

"Ah, no questions for me, Yona dear?" he asked lightly. "I could tell you so many stories about my village and the people that lived there. It would make your hair curl even more, I'm sure." He leaned forward and held a strand lightly in his hands, expression intent.

 

She shook her head, pulling her hair loose and patting his shoulder. "It's fine, Jaeha. This isn't an interrogation of any sort, you know."

 

"What's not an interrogation?" Hak strode into the small camp, eyebrows raised. "What were you all discussing while I was gone?"

 

Yona stood up and smiled brightly up at Hak. "Just talking about siblings and such," she pushed the conversation away. "Did you find anything at all? Anything we need to worry about?" She bit her lip, she didn't want any of them in danger anytime soon. They were all just recovering from the last battle.

 

Hak shook his head and Zeno eyed the group, his expression unreadable for a moment. "The miss was talking to the others about family?" he asked.

 

No one was crass enough to ask Zeno about any family of his; anyone he had in his life was long gone, to the point where he knew that his village wasn't even the same anymore. Yona gave a hesitant nod, unsure of the atmosphere that seemed to settle down on them.

 

Yun saved them all, whether it was intuition from knowing them and their moods so well, by taking Yona by the hand and practically dragging her away. "Here, you're going to help me tonight," he said flatly, keeping his tone brisk. "You said you wanted to learn how to make this and while you're not as bad as before, you still have awhile to go."

 

She blinked at that and flushed a little, but accepted the out when it was given, not caring that it made her a coward that couldn't face the looks that the others were exchanging between themselves. She had a horribly guilty sense when it came to Zeno at the moment and her heart twisted inside and right now, it was hard to face him, not with so many others around.

 

~

 

Zeno blinked at Yona suddenly being taken away by Yun, Hak trailing after and just shrugging at the dragons, as if to say he wasn't sure what had happened either. Zeno hadn't expected her to basically flee when he came in with that line of questioning and sat in her vacated spot, looking over the others, who had various degrees of surprise on their faces at Yona's sudden absence. "Zeno is sorry if he seemed to have chased the Miss away," he pushed out his brightest smile, trying to deflect it all away.

 

_What had she sensed_? Yona had given him all sorts of questioning looks after he had told her that she was Hiryuu's reincarnation, but he sensed something different about this moment.  _Was it the line about family_?

 

"No, I don't think it was you alone, Zeno," Jaeha said absently. "She's getting better at seeing through any lies we tell to deflect her from our past before her."

 

"Ah, Zeno understands," Zeno had to laugh at that. He had deflected for so long, so many long years, that he wasn't even sure anymore of himself sometimes. He only told them a little and even that was difficult to open up and let out. He was afraid that if he let it all out, it was crack open his heart and he wouldn't be able to hold in the pain any longer.

 

He didn't want any of them, especially the Miss, to see that part of him.

 

Kija chewed on his lower lip, looking between all of them, unsure of how to broach the subject. "Ah… I take it that you were not jesting when you insinuated that your childhood was not a good one?" he asked softly.

 

Jaeha shook his head. "No, it wasn't," he said bluntly, "and I left my village as soon as I could, because I refused to be chained down in that village any longer than I had to be."

 

Zeno looked away. He was the only one that knew that it was not metaphorical chains that Jaeha was speaking of, but Jaeha wasn't finished yet and what he said next made everyone's eyes grow wide.

 

"This is another thing I do not want shared with our dear Yona—although I am sure at some point she will somehow learn." His smile was bittersweet. "It becomes harder to hide and yet harder still to want to keep silent around her."  He tilted his head at Zeno. "Is this normal, old man?"

 

Zeno laughed softly at that. "It was hard to hide anything from Hiryuu," he agreed, expression far away. "Although he could hide everything from us, it seemed. At least the important things."

 

"Ah…" Jaeha winced at the bitterness that flavored Zeno's words. "Well, this at least—it is mild at best, but something I always wondered about with the other dragons, when I was a child, at least." He tugged on his hair, trying to think of how to proceed. "My predecessor at one point, told me that I had a twin." He ignored the gasp of shock from Kija and Zeno, and Shin-ah's stare seemed all too intense at the moment. "I don't know if he was trying to be kind or cruel at the time, but when I was seven, he let it be known that there was a child that my mother loved and the village doted over and that was the one child that hadn't been born a monster."

 

"Jaeha…" Kija's voice was hushed. "I didn't think it was possible, but… I suppose—" he shook his head. "We are born like any other…"

 

Jaeha shrugged. "At least my mother had a child that she could love and Gar…my predecessor raised me for twelve years, so I wasn't entirely alone. Someone was  _always_  there, looking at me." His hand clenched briefly at his side and he saw Zeno giving him a pained look.

 

_I would lay bets that Zeno knows all my secrets, all of our secrets. I wouldn’t be surprised if he spied on us as well, testing us to see if we were worthy to fight alongside, as well as worthy to protect his reborn king._

"I saw him once as I left the village," Jaeha tried to sound nonchalant, but there was a pained tone to his voice that gave voice to the truth of it. "Barely saw him as I flew away. I believe he told me to stay, but I couldn't oblige." He pushed back his hair. "I had stayed in one place for far too long as it was."

 

Silence fell after that statement and even Kija seemed to be at a loss for words.

Shin-ah looked nervous for a moment and then without warning, pushed into Jaeha, who scrambled to keep from falling into Kija. It was like a line of dominoes and there was a pleased little smile on his face at the laughter that erupted, dispelling the somber mood that hung over all of them.

 

Zeno grinned and brushed himself off. "Aha, Seiryuu has learned how to be playful! Zeno taught him a good thing," he beamed at him and tackled Shin-ah in a hug, grateful for the distraction, happy that the mood had shifted and no one was asking him or anyone else anymore private questions. There was learning about each other and then there was digging up what didn't need to be brought up.

 

"I think the lad is going to have us help with dinner as well," Zeno helped Kija up, nearly toppling back over himself. "And it's starting to smell good, good!" he gave him all another quick smile and dashed off to where Yona and Hak and Yun were. Yona may have felt uneasy inside, but right now, he'd take that to uncomfortable questions.

 

~

 

It was late, the darkest moment of the day before dawn hit, when Yona found him in the field, where he had been staring up at the tapestry of stars. He felt her come before she made a disturbance in crushing sweet meadow flowers under her hesitant step.

 

"The Miss is up early," he said softly, not moving at all, feeling her sit next to him. "Zeno is surprised that she's not with the Mister."

 

"I knew you were out here," her voice was just as quiet, even though they were far enough away from the camp that they wouldn't wake up anyone with their conversation. "I wanted to apologize for running away earlier. It wasn't nice of me at all, Zeno. I didn't mean to hurt you."

 

He turned his head at that, seeing her biting her lip in such a cute way that he smiled and reached out to pat her hand. "The Miss didn't mean anything by it and Zeno wasn't bothered at all."

 

Yona's look changed at that and she shook her head at his lie. "I don't think so, Zeno. It bothered you a lot and possibly for the same reason why I was bothered earlier." She lay flat on her back, staring up at the stars as Zeno was. "I had a feeling about you and the question of family," she said quietly. "Not just the one you had with…with Hiryuu."

 

He blinked at that, wondering what sort of thing she had sensed and how she had.  _Maybe telling her about Hiryuu wasn't the right thing to do at that moment._  Especially if she had been aware enough to make that sort of statement.

 

"The Miss is thinking too much about it!" he chirped, trying to direct her attention away. "Zeno has a new family with everyone the miss brought with her!"

 

"You had a brother," she said softly, turning on her side and meeting his shocked eyes. "Didn't you, Zeno?" she reached out and grasped his hands in hers, so that he couldn't run away and her gaze was intent and almost unsettling in how much she reminded him of Hiryuu in that moment. He had been speaking the truth in how difficult it had been to hide things from Hiryuu once Hiryuu had wanted to know something. His heart twisted painfully. It still hurt, after all the years that had passed by.

 

"Miss…" he tried to pull away, but her grip was too strong and he felt the unwilling tug of the blood that said to /obey/ and he knew she wasn't doing it on purpose, but it still hurt.

 

Yona reached out with her other hand and touched his hair. "I'm sorry we took you away," she whispered to him.

 

Now she was scaring him, with her look and her words and he was certain Yona wasn't quite aware of this conversation that she was having. "Miss—" he made his voice urgent. "The Miss didn't take Zeno away from anyone! Zeno chose to be with everyone, remember?"

 

Yona sighed and turned back over, releasing Zeno's hands at the same time. "I know, Zeno—" she whispered. "I know that you chose to come with this group, to be with us and protect us." She fiddled with her skirt and Zeno couldn't help but watch her movements, tense for her next words. Even with all his years and tensed and poised to run if she spoke, she still caught him by surprise. "But I wish that your twin could have come, too."

 

"Why does the Miss think that Zeno had a twin?" he asked, voice choked and not at all what he wanted to do to hide his past.

 

She was quiet for a few moments and her own laughter was strained. "Because I had a dream about it," she murmured, one hand reaching out to the sky as if she could grasp a handful of stars to bring down to earth to them.

 

(As a dragon, had Hiryuu done just that?)

 

"I know you think it might be silly, dreaming about things that had never happened to me, but… " she looked thoughtful. "Perhaps it is all silly dreams and wishes, brought on by what you told me."

 

Zeno wished with all his heart he could tell her that 'yes, you are just dreaming. It's all moonshine and hope and none of it is real', but he couldn't lie that much, not when so much was close to the surface, not when so much of who Yona had been skimmed the top of her personality.

 

"Maybe some of the dreams the Miss has are true," Zeno allowed and reached out again to touch her hand. That bit of touch, that comfort warmed him and he took a deep breath. It had ceased to just be Hiryuu that he had loved and followed and mutated into the love he felt for Yona as herself. She was the one his blood would follow for as long as she was alive. "What did the Miss dream and maybe Zeno can tell her if it was true or not."

 

Yona was quiet long enough that Zeno thought she had given up or fallen asleep, but then she spoke and her voice was quiet and unsure. "I can't say for certain," she murmured, "it's not like real life, where everything is clear. It's more feelings than anything, which is why I am more certain, in some ways. You, Zeno, though—when you walked in on that conversation about family, it was such a  _strong_  feeling at that time and went I slept, I dreamt that you had a brother that you left behind. Your twin, that couldn't follow you." She gave an embarrassed laugh. "Maybe I'm just making things up about you so that I can feel closer."

 

"No, Miss," Zeno turned to face her fully, touching her hair and staring into her eyes. He still hadn't released his grip on her hand and now she was the one that couldn't pull away. "Zeno did have a brother, a long, long time ago." He took a deep breath and continued. "When the Ouryuu came to Zeno's village and spoke with him, there was only one of us that could go with him. Zeno's brother wasn't what the Ouryuu wanted and so Zeno had to leave him and his family behind."

 

She squeezed his hand, a tear slipping out. There was so much more he wasn't saying. All those thousands of years ago and a place where his village wasn't any longer. No one to visit, no descendents to look back on, no family shrines to pay homage to those that had passed.

 

Zeno felt his heart crack a little and some of that pain he had tried to keep bottled up earlier slipped out, caught up in the warm and caring aura of Yona's soul. "Zeno found himself a wonderful family in Hiryuu and Seiryuu and Ryokuryuu and Hakuryuu," he said softly, not giving their names, not even now, not even to Yona. Maybe she would dream about her original dragons, maybe not. He wasn't going to push it and every moment he held their names close to his heart, was a moment he could treasure. "The hardest part was going home and everyone changed. Zeno had changed so much as Ouryuu's chosen, but Zeno's brother changed more and more, like the others did. Growing older. Having a wife…"

 

His voice broke here, he couldn't help it as he remembered the exuberant smile that Kaya had given him when he surprised her with a flower to wrap in her hair, or her little pouts as she made him food.

 

"Having children and growing old. No one in Zeno's village except his brother knew him. Zeno had changed in different ways, but not ways that they knew how to explain." His voice was practically a whisper and then he smiled a little, trying to push away some of the sorrow, to tease a smile out of the tears that Yona was shedding now for Zeno.

 

"Did you know that Zeno had hair like the lad's one time?" he asked and Yona blinked and rubbed at her eyes. "Darker, maybe—" he tilted his head. That was hard to remember. "But when Zeno became Ouryuu's chosen, it turned to this color." He gave her a bright smile. "Does the Miss think it suits Zeno?"

 

Yona was obviously trying to redirect her thoughts into the direction Zeno was obviously trying to hard to push them into. "I … I think it reminds me of sunshine," she said finally. "Like you, Zeno—you always remind me of sunshine."

 

"Even after the Miss found out about Zeno?" he asked. He had to know and his hand tightened in her hair a moment from sheer nervousness.

 

"Even then," she confirmed, edging closer and wrapping her arms around him fully. "I am sorry, Zeno," she murmured into his hair. "For what happened to you, for not knowing… " she felt him shudder a moment and she held onto him all the tighter. "I know we can never replace who you had before, but we will be here for you."

 

_Until you die and leave me again,_ Zeno thought sadly and gripped onto Yona tighter. He couldn't lose her again and he didn't want to be alone again.

 

Her next words took his breath away entirely.

 

"And if I have to turn over heaven and earth to do it, you'll be coming with me this time. You won't even be alone again."

 

Zeno had to laugh softly at the image of it all; he could easily imagine Yona doing everything in her power to make this promise of hers come true and something inside him settled. She could do it, he knew—once she was back in the heavens, she would have the power to do what she wished and it warmed him all the way through that even if she didn't remember the past or her life as one of the heavenly dragons, her first promise was for him.

 

"Don't return to the heavens yet, Miss," he murmured. "Zeno wants to see what else the Miss can do while she's on the earth."


End file.
